Finding some pleasure
Posted by Amateur Teacher on Thursday, June 21, 2012
"The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid." - Jane Austen
Oh, Jane! How right you are! (Side note here: If you know me, then you know that I can and will compare any life event to any given Austen novel at any given time. Now I can continue...) I have had plenty of pleasure in good novels the last two weeks. While on vacation last week, I took along my Nook... but it stopped working. Or so I thought. It had, in fact, ran out of battery, but I was too stupid to realize that until the end of the week. However, my father in law let me borrow a book that was written by a local author. How neat is that? They even had posters for it at the local bookstore! (Another side note: I have never seen as many bookstores in one place as I did in Minnesota. They were EVERYWHERE! And they were busy! And I'm not talkin' Barnes and Noble-style, I'm talkin' little mom and pop bookstores. I loved it! Anyways... another tangent.) The book was great and I was so glad I finished it before we left. I read like a mad woman since it was 499 pages and I only had a week to read it. It ended up not being an impossible task since it was a great read! Here's the author's website.
Well, when my silly self realized that the Nook was just dead, not dead dead, and being finished with the borrowed book, I decided to tackle a book I have been working on since the beginning of this last school year: Don Quixote. I know you remember all my stories of this past year and how I pretty much just wanted to curl up in a ball and suck my thumb and pull my hair out at least every other day. That type of situation makes it very difficult to find pleasure in a good novel, which made me feel intolerably stupid. Maybe if I had just plunged myself into something I enjoyed, such as book, this year would have been more bearable. (A thought I will keep in mind for this coming year.)
So, now that it's summer, I brought Don Quixote back. And, let me tell you, I have so enjoyed it! I have laughed out loud, slapped my knee, shared excerpts with my husband, learned new words, rolled my eyes, cheered, yelled, gotten fed up with his ridiculous character, you name it! I know what some of you are thinking right now, "Don Quixote? Why in the world would you read that old thing?! Haven't you heard of Twilight and Fifty Shades of Grey?" Yes, I have heard of those. But there is something about breaking open a classic (I read Dracula last summer, holy moly, scared the mess outta me) that is like being part of history. All those old books give you an idea of what things used to be like. Some were written for a specific reason (think Frankenstein) and, yes, some were written just for fun. Those old books are like treasures to me. For some reason I highly doubt that people will look back in 50 or more years and think to themselves, "WOW, Twilight, now that was a classic!" Yeeeeaaah... I'll let you think about that one.
By no means am I trying to sound like some kind of snob. I just want to encourage you to pick up an old dusty book and try it out. You'll be surprised at how much you learn, laugh, cry, and enjoy the past. I'm thankful for summer and the opportunity it brings me to find some pleasure in a good novel.
Oh, Jane! How right you are! (Side note here: If you know me, then you know that I can and will compare any life event to any given Austen novel at any given time. Now I can continue...) I have had plenty of pleasure in good novels the last two weeks. While on vacation last week, I took along my Nook... but it stopped working. Or so I thought. It had, in fact, ran out of battery, but I was too stupid to realize that until the end of the week. However, my father in law let me borrow a book that was written by a local author. How neat is that? They even had posters for it at the local bookstore! (Another side note: I have never seen as many bookstores in one place as I did in Minnesota. They were EVERYWHERE! And they were busy! And I'm not talkin' Barnes and Noble-style, I'm talkin' little mom and pop bookstores. I loved it! Anyways... another tangent.) The book was great and I was so glad I finished it before we left. I read like a mad woman since it was 499 pages and I only had a week to read it. It ended up not being an impossible task since it was a great read! Here's the author's website.
Well, when my silly self realized that the Nook was just dead, not dead dead, and being finished with the borrowed book, I decided to tackle a book I have been working on since the beginning of this last school year: Don Quixote. I know you remember all my stories of this past year and how I pretty much just wanted to curl up in a ball and suck my thumb and pull my hair out at least every other day. That type of situation makes it very difficult to find pleasure in a good novel, which made me feel intolerably stupid. Maybe if I had just plunged myself into something I enjoyed, such as book, this year would have been more bearable. (A thought I will keep in mind for this coming year.)
So, now that it's summer, I brought Don Quixote back. And, let me tell you, I have so enjoyed it! I have laughed out loud, slapped my knee, shared excerpts with my husband, learned new words, rolled my eyes, cheered, yelled, gotten fed up with his ridiculous character, you name it! I know what some of you are thinking right now, "Don Quixote? Why in the world would you read that old thing?! Haven't you heard of Twilight and Fifty Shades of Grey?" Yes, I have heard of those. But there is something about breaking open a classic (I read Dracula last summer, holy moly, scared the mess outta me) that is like being part of history. All those old books give you an idea of what things used to be like. Some were written for a specific reason (think Frankenstein) and, yes, some were written just for fun. Those old books are like treasures to me. For some reason I highly doubt that people will look back in 50 or more years and think to themselves, "WOW, Twilight, now that was a classic!" Yeeeeaaah... I'll let you think about that one.
By no means am I trying to sound like some kind of snob. I just want to encourage you to pick up an old dusty book and try it out. You'll be surprised at how much you learn, laugh, cry, and enjoy the past. I'm thankful for summer and the opportunity it brings me to find some pleasure in a good novel.